The Glow
by BeeBurgers
Summary: A one off about a ghoul in the wasteland and the effects of the wilderness on the mind. Enjoy!


The Glow

Radiation had peculiar feeling to it, almost unnoticeable, like sensing the faintest of breezes. As James took in a deep breath, he could feel it permeating throughout his body. It warmed his bones, tingled in his blood and softly burned against his skin. If he still had his Geiger counter, it would probably be crackling and popping with rads. It would have been a not too silent voice that urged him to get away from the poisonous radiation.

Oddly enough, he was reminded of a time when he'd been trapped underground. No light or sound, just the cold earth beneath him to remind James that he was still alive. Lying in the crater was the opposite. Where the cave had deprived him of his senses, the remnants of a nuclear bomb overwhelmed them. The sun glaring down from the sky, the radioactive material burning up from beneath, like his body was trying to vanish. His eyesight, couldn't handle the intensity of the sun, nor could his skin interpret the bombardment of radiation without being swamped. Even before the radiation had taken his hair away, turned his skin into a rotted mess, James had always been intrigued by nuclear fallout.

Maybe that was why he'd been banished from his caravan. They were ghouls just like he was, but they claimed he was turning feral. They said he'd soon turn on everyone around him. Either way, they'd turned on him, told him to leave. Even Lucile had turned her back, telling him she'd rather him disappear into the wastes than to see him become a monster.

At long last the sun sank behind the horizon, bathing the world in shadow. It was at night, in the cold embrace of night…that was when he could feel truly harmonized with the world around him. In the day, his half burned eyes couldn't see the soft glow that permeated his skin. In the dark, everything was clearer. He could see his veins pulsing with energy, and feel the heat that emanated from his body.

When they'd exiled him from the caravan, they'd only given him a pistol. Maybe they'd hoped he'd turn it on himself. After only a short time, James had thrown the weapon away. He needed a gun about as much as he needed a flashlight. The exposed bones, where the flesh had peeled away, created a set of claws that could rend flesh with graceful ease. And he'd proved it just the other day. Strolling through the darkness, he'd discovered a human. Not like those who'd been in his caravan, who'd become ghouls long ago, but a breathing, living human. Though James may have faintly glowed, that human, a man long ago driven mad by the harsh wastelands, had seemed as luminous as the sun. He'd been alive with the warmth of life, his heartbeat like a thundering drum, his breathing so loud it seemed to echo off the surrounding hills.

Even with his limited vision, James had sensed something wrong with the solitary man. This mad man, this fellow exile, was deformed, warped by something the ghoul couldn't identify. There was a harshness about the loner, a kind of gruff demeanor, but the longer his dim eyes had remained on the individual, the more James felt that there was just something wrong. Something unnatural, tainted.

In the time since his exile, the ghoul had become strong. He'd eaten animals, the more raw the meat the better, and their life had given him new strength. When he'd slaughtered the madman, though, that was something altogether new. It was as though every fiber in the loner's body had been filled with energy, and once he'd freed the energy from its mortal coil, it belonged to James.

As he strolled through the empty wastes, the night air as cool as ever, the ghoul could hear the sound of others. By chance or providence, he'd stumbled on a group wandering through the desert. They'd set up a fire and appeared to be settling down for the night. Though its light burned his eyes, the fire held no warmth, not when five others sat around its edge. Though they didn't share the same energy and vitality that the mad man had, they still had the taint, the unnatural, indescribable warped visage about them.

One of them moved away from the fire, away from the safety and light. It took him a moment, she looked so distorted from the last time he'd seen her, but there was no mistaking the ghoul who'd stepped away as anyone but Lucile. At one point in time, James might have described her as beautiful. He'd told her the same many times. The two of them had shared their second lives together. As he neared her though, he remembered her harsh words on the day of his exile. He remembered how she'd pointed a rifle at him, saying she didn't want to see him again. Like the others, she'd turned her back away.

It was then that he realized what was wrong with her, the same thing that had been wrong with the mad man. They were the monsters. It explained everything. That was why they were so ugly, so disfigured. That was why he'd been given this newfound strength, why they stood out so easily from everything else. They were monsters, and by slaughtering them, he'd be granted even more strength. His hatred for her and the caravan mixed with insatiable hunger and forced a low growl from his rotted throat.

"James?" Lucile asked, turning to look at him. As close as he was, her face was lit by the elegant glow that emanated from his body. _Not anymore,_ he thought to himself. He was something more, more than his old life, and more than her. With an inhuman roar, James darted forward, both clawed hands set to slaughter the abomination in front of him.

A/N: I wrote this a while ago and never thought to put it here... until now.


End file.
